Background
Dunbar, Carl Owen was born on January 1, 1891 in Hallowell, Kansas, United States. Son of David and Emma (Thomas) Dunbar.
Dunbar, Carl Owen was born on January 1, 1891 in Hallowell, Kansas, United States. Son of David and Emma (Thomas) Dunbar.
Graduate, Cherokee County (Kansas) High School, 1909. Bachelor, University Kansas, 1913. Doctor of Philosophy, Yale, 1917.
He was a Professor of Geology at Yale University from 1920 until 1959. He was also Director of the Peabody Museum of Natural History at Yale University from 1942 until 1959. As editor of a textbook series on historical geology from the 1920s through the 1950s, his work was published and sold in over 1 million books
Between 1918 and 1920, Dunbar taught geology at the University of Minnesota.
In 1920, when Charles Schuchert retired from his professorship at Yale University, he recommended Dunbar as his replacement. Dunbar taught at Yale University from 1920 to 1959.
Dunbar was a worldwide expert on the evolution of fusulines during the Pennyslvannian and Permian periods of the late Paleozoic age. In 1927, his work, published with G. East. Condra, is considered the first definitive study on fusulinids and Foraminifera.
Dunbar published a series of textbooks at Yale University on historical geology.
These books "dominated the field through the 1920s and 1930s and made a major contribution to professional education in earth science." At the end of his career, Dunbar’s textbooks had sold close to a million copies. Dunbar is also notable for his seventeen years as the Director of the Peabody Museum of Natural History at Yale University. Dunbar and his predecessor A. East. Parr were responsible overseeing Rudolph Zallinger and his work on one hundred-foot mural of the Age of Reptiles, a project that earned Zallinger a Pulitzer Prize.
Member National Academy of Sciences, American Philosophical Society, Paleontological Society, Geological Society of America, American Association for the Advancement of Science, Society Economic Paleontologists and Mineralogists, American Academy Arts and Sciences, Geological Society London, Geological Society Mexico, Skytop Club, Dunedin country Club, Sigma Xi.
Married Lora Beamer, September 18, 1915. Children: Carl Owen, Lora Louise.